What happened to the weather? It was supposed to be beautiful this weekend but after the rain on Saturday we woke up to fog and drizzle on Sunday. It looked like another bad day until Todd decided he was going to lead Retribution (5.10b), wet rock and all. He spent some time hanging below the crux to dry off the crucial pocket but otherwise cruised it. We all did Retribution and Nosedive (also 5.10b but way harder) and I got them both clean despite the conditions. Then we wandered on down to the Mac wall where Todd decided to lead Try Again (5.10). The man was on a mission.

To everyone's surprise he fell off the crux (blame the dampish rock). And I had explicitly asked him if he was going to fall off before he started! Luckily there was plenty of rope drag so he didn't take me off my feet this time. When I followed it I stopped at the famous jump move. From a ledge you have to jump to this jug. Well, I'm probably the most static climber you'll ever see. Dynoing just isn't my thing.

"You don't have to jump," a climber to my left said. "You can go up left."

I looked over and saw all the chalk to my left and instantly decided I was going that way. It's more moves but Dawn doesn't dyno. The next challenge was the crux, which I'd been on before one day when Todd led Co-existence and I couldn't pull the roof, so I'd tried pulling the roof on Try Again instead with a similar lack of sucess. On Sunday I managed on the second try, even though the holds were a little bit greasy, so I felt pretty good about that.

Once we were all done with Try Again we TR'd Co-existence (5.10+). This was actually my third time on the route. The first time, as I mentioned, I hadn't been able to pull the roof at all. The second time I got through it after a lot of beta (and a little pulling) from Todd. So on Sunday I had some hope of getting it clean, but that wasn't to be. Next time though.

I wanted to lead something. My lead head is too fragile these days to go a whole weekend without, so we pulled out the book to find something in my grade in the area. Somehow we ended up with Groovy (5.8+), not in the area and a little steep for me these days but very G rated and I'd followed it cleanly in the past so it seemed like a good choice. I was doing OK at first but got a bit panicked when my legs started doing the Elvis thing and I couldn't make them stop. Steven suggested that I bail right to a good stance. I'd already thought of that. It seemed a bit like cheating, but once I had an invitation . . .

With steadier legs I got back into the corner and climbed up to the crux - the traverse under the roof. I was in a horrible smooshed position with my entire left arm stuck into the crack under the roof, my helmet jammed into the corner and my legs up by my waist. I knew I couldn't spend long in this position, but my lead head was screaming for gear. Luckily, Steven had told me on the ground exactly which piece I needed and where it went so I managed to fumble it in almost blindly. From there it's one move till you can clip the anchor, which I did as soon as was humanly possible. I wasn't stopping there though - I was moving up to the higher anchor (the Ursula anchor) so we could TR Space Invaders afterward.

I was a little stymied. I couldn't figure out how to get past the anchor. Then I realized - I needed to use the chocked block the slings were around. Because anchors are normally "off limits" the block itself had become invisible to me. Once I got that figured out I moved pretty quickly to the top anchor and lowered off, feeling really good about the lead. I'd been scared more than a few times but I'd remembered to repeat "I am strong and confident" to myself instead of crying for my belayer to help me.

I think the times I've been coerced into hanging on gear since my lead head problem started really have helped. Now when I'm feeling desperate I concentrate on getting in a piece and I think to myself that I'll hang from it once its in. This helps me to feel like safety is eminent and not all the way up at the anchor. Then once the piece goes in, I usually find that I relax enough to carry on without hanging from it.

As a final bonus, I flashed Space Invaders (5.10+) on TR, the hardest route I've climbed cleanly at the Gunks yet. It was a great day, only spoiled by the fact that my Cowboys lost. But I guess you can't win them all.

9/16/00 & 9/17/00

Todd and I leave for Yosemite at the end of the week so my focus this weekend was on mileage and multi-pitch.

On Saturday, Steven suggested I lead Snooky's Return (5.8). I'd been on it before but didn't remember a thing about it. He told me I'd followed it cleanly but had said I wouldn't like to have led it. I took one look at it and knew why.

"I really need things that are pretty G these days," I said.

"Snooky's is totally G," Steven said. "You can put gear in every two feet."

"Good gear," I qualified, eyeing the thin seam that occasionally opened into a narrow flaring crack.

"It's bomber gear," he insisted.

So I racked up. Well, I didn't have to get very far off the ground (just to the crux) to realize my instincts had been right. The small nut I had in as my highest piece didn't inspire me with confidence.

"It's not even the smallest nut," Steven argued. It was smaller than any non-brass nut Todd carries, so it was plenty small in my mind, but the size wasn't really the problem. The problem was that I could see the entire nut, no part of it was hidden by a bump, constriction, or even a small crystal. The nut was held in place solely by friction and its own slight taper.

Having faith in neither the nut nor the move, I chose to come down. Steven suggested Thin Slabs Direct instead.

"This is the same route," I said after a quick glance. "You can't fool me." Sure, it was 5.7 instead of 5.8 and when the crack opened up, it opened up farther, but the moves and the pro were similar - thin slab moves over small, sketchy nuts.

So Steven led it. Trying to make it look smooth, easy and well-protected, he rushed it and succeeded instead in making me giggle when he sketched through a move and then spent a few minutes fiddling with marginal gear. I was glad I'd stuck to my guns and when I sketched through the same moves following it I was even gladder. BTW, the third pitch of this route is a real attention getter at 5.7.

On Sunday I had a fear-hangover from Snooky's and worried my way through the first pitch of Horseman's (5.5) despite the availability of great gear everywhere. So when Todd suggested we get on City of Lights (5.7) I immediately panicked.

Now some people will tell you that City of Lights is a sandbag and I happen to be one of them. My history with the route goes like this: I led it early in my career and fell repeatedly at the crux, onto what I don't remember because I had a sort of blind faith in gear back then, but eventually I pulled the move.

My second attempt at leading the route was more recent, during the height of my lead head crisis. On that day I made an epic out of it: climbing up, climbing down, hanging, taking practice falls, swapping gear in and out, bailing, starting up again, and, finally, pulling the move.

On Sunday I was relieved to discover that Todd meant to lead the route himself. We were after mileage, after all. Todd zipped through it, set a belay above the normal spot to avoid some congestion, and put me on. I stepped confidently up to the move . . . and couldn't do it!

I was amazed. I had always assumed that I'd cruise the move on top rope, that my problems with it were caused by fear, or the weight of the rack, not by the move itself. Repeatedly I launched myself at the out-of-reach jug and repeatedly I slid back down the rock to my previous stance. I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry (but I knew I wanted the sympathetic stranger underneath me to stop giving me beta and encouragement). Finally, I forsook all finesse and powered through it in one desperate blast.

Now I think I should try leading the route again. I won't be afraid of it next time, I think, because now I know that I can't do the damn move. So maybe I'll surprise myself and do it.

9/23/00 - 10/01/00

Todd and I were in Yosemite. Check out the trip report: Climbers Are the Only Animals That Self-Deprecate, You Know.